


January 2006

by YoYossarian



Series: Outside Looking In [1]
Category: Figure Skating RPF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-26
Updated: 2018-03-26
Packaged: 2019-04-08 07:23:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14100315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YoYossarian/pseuds/YoYossarian
Summary: They’re still backstage when they find out that it isn’t enough, that they’re not enough. They’re first alternates to the 2006 Olympic team. They’re third and there isn’t a spot for them in Turin.OrNavigating motherhood when you're no longer the person your child turns to for comfort.





	January 2006

**Author's Note:**

> Still feel pretty awkward about this whole RPF thing, but here I am.

Nationals are in Ottawa this year, which should be a good thing, their home province and all; everyone they love, everyone who’s supported them for the past eight and a half years, is packed into the arena. Their families, parents and siblings who have sacrificed so much to give them the opportunity to pursue their dream, are on their feet, furiously clapping and whistling from the crowd.

They’re in first place after the free dance, a performance they’re proud of, but there are four teams left to skate and all they can do is wait. Wait and hope that the three skates they’ve laid down are enough to prove beyond a doubt that they belong on the Olympic team bound for Turin next month. They’ve done all they can.

The next forty five minutes are excruciating. They sit backstage, shoulder to shoulder, eyes locked on the monitors while the rest of the teams perform. Scott can’t sit still, but for once she finds that his fidgeting is a welcome distraction. He wrings his hands together, throws an arm around her shoulder, grips her knee. Tessa sits too still, chewing her lip, and wondering, however fleetingly, if she’ll be able to keep it together. Even at sixteen, she’s by far the the more even tempered of the two, better at controlling her expressions, better at keeping her emotions contained. Scott wears his heart on his sleeve, for better or for worse. Their partnership is built on balance; when he spins wildly in one direction she pivots and flexes, adapts and soothes, the yin to his yang.

\-----

They’re still backstage when they find out that it isn’t enough, that _they’re_ not enough. They’re first alternates to the 2006 Olympic team. They’re third and there isn’t a spot for them in Turin.

Marina hugs them and makes noise about Worlds and about home ice in 2010, but neither of them are capable of finding that headspace, not yet when this defeat is so raw.

In the end, they’re both quiet, Tessa drained and despondent, Scott with hard eyes and a clenched jaw. He clutches her hand, probably too hand, as they skate out to accept bronze. They force smiles, his is more of a grimace, and take their bows. The medals weigh heavily around their necks.

Their families eat dinner together in the hotel that night, though neither Tessa nor Scott are very hungry or say very much at all. His jaw hasn't come unclenched and her cheeks are impossibly pale. No one mentions the results or Nationals or skating at all, but the atmosphere is heavy and everyone agree to call it an early night. They’re heading home to London in the morning; Tessa and Scott have a few days off before they return to Canton everyone agrees that they could use the rest.

\-----

It’s close to midnight when Kate’s cell phone rings. She’s usually in bed by now, but the past few days have been so emotionally trying that she’s puttering around the kitchen, wiping down the counters and making herself a cup of tea. Tessa shut herself in her bedroom as soon as they got home and hadn’t even come down for dinner. She’s devastated and it’s heartbreaking.

Kate, though she tries to hide it, isn’t used to being shut out of her daughter’s life. Sure, Tessa is sixteen, a difficult age by any standard, but sometimes she wonders if the move to Canton was a good idea. The distance has been hard on everyone.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Kate,” Alama’s voice is low. “Sorry to bother you so late, but Scotty went out for a drive a few hours ago and still hasn’t come home. His phone is going straight to voicemail and Joe thinks he’s fine, we all think he’s probably fine, but you know how he gets and I can’t help but worry... Have you seen him?”

“Oh, Alma,” Kate breathes. “I’m sorry, but I haven’t seen him since we left the… Well, hold on one minute.”

She pads from the kitchen into the hall and peers out the front window. She hasn’t seen Scott, but after today she can’t help but wonder… Once her eyes adjust to the darkness, she recognizes the faded blue pickup truck parked two houses down.

\-----

Scott is comfortable in the Virtue home; they treat him like another son and he’s always waltzed right in the front door, but things have been different since the move to Canton. He and Tessa, always close such good friends, have had to rely on each other so much more in the past few years. They have their spats, like any teenagers do, but they’ve also built up a protective bubble around themselves, around their skating and their partnership, a safe space just for them and Kate has never felt less a part of her child’s life, a life that Tessa has decided to absolutely dedicate a partnership and to a shared dream, neither of which include her mother.

She’s had trouble navigating this new relationship with her daughter, though Jim seems confident that Tessa is happy in Canton and absolutely safe with Scott. He’s noticed the shift, too, the strengthening and solidifying of the partnership, their daughter’s single mindedness, but it doesn’t worry him.

“Scotty’s just looking out for her, Kate,” he insists when she opens up, somewhat sheepishly, about her concerns. “They’re in this together. It's what she wants.”

He doesn’t lie awake at night imagining what could happen, what might happen, to their bright, fierce, stubbornly determined daughter if this all falls apart. They have four children, but the older three haven't prepared her for this; there's no guide book for navigating this, god knows she's looked. And it’s not that she doesn’t believe, doesn’t support the dream, but she’s a mother first and foremost and she’s terrified of what the loss of this dream would do to her youngest child.

Alma is more understanding.

“Scott has always been the most emotional of my boys,” Alma shares a few weeks before Nationals. “He’s wrapped up in this goal and this partnership heart and soul. I worry sometimes that he doesn’t know himself apart from Tessa, but I’m also so proud of what they’ve accomplished together. The funny thing is that I’m not sure there’s anything we could do to stop it now, even if we wanted to, even if we decided that it was for the best. They’re both so driven, so determined. We can’t take this away from them just because we’re afraid.”

So in the end, they do nothing, say nothing, trust the system and the coaches to support their children, trust their children to support each other if this all goes belly up.

\-----

“You know what, I see his truck outside. Let me just run upstairs and make sure…” she trails off, climbing the carpeted stairs and walking down the short hallway to Tessa’s room. Alma’s relief is palpable, even through the phone.

“Tessa, honey,” Kate taps gently on her daughter’s closed bedroom door, phone in hand, before quietly twisting the knob.

The door isn’t locked. Tessa’s desk lamp is on, bathing the room in soft light, and there they are, curled tightly together in the twin bed, both clad in sweatpants and t-shirts, on top of the duvet. His jacket is hanging over the back of her desk chair and the window screen is propped against the wall. There’s an old maple tree in the yard with branches that must extend close enough to the roof for him to have been able to avoid using the front door.

Their eyes are closed and Kate thinks for a moment that they must be asleep, but then she sees that Tessa’s eyes are screwed shut and cheeks are wet with tears. Scott, his face half buried in her neck, is murmuring softly to her. He glances up when Kate steps into the room, but doesn’t look embarrassed to have been caught. His eyes, when they capture hers, are cool and defiant. His arms are wrapped protectively around her daughter and he isn’t letting go. Their bubble, their fortress, has never been more visible and Kate suddenly realizes that _she’s_ the one who doesn’t belong here, _she’s_ the outsider.

She raises the phone back to her ear.

“He’s here, Alma. He’s safe. He’ll be home tomorrow.”

She nods softly to him, this tenacious, fiery teenager to whom she’s entrusted her child, and backs out of the room, shutting the door behind her. She’ll always be Tessa’s mother and she’ll always worry, but from even from the outside the bubble looks solid and safe.


End file.
